A good day.

Sometimes, I fall into a defensive crouch. I put so much pressure on myself that I go into a kind of awful tunnel vision. It is dark in the tunnel, and the critical voices in my head like it in there and use it as a kind of echo chamber. Magical thinking, which I try to resist, lifts its head and senses its opportunity, and tells me that I shall never come to any good.

As I wrangle and struggle with my book, I see only the things which are not there. It will never be good enough, I am not good enough to make it good enough, the agent will know it is not good enough and will have to tell me so.

Then a shift in perspective comes, and I go back to the beginning, with clear eyes. Today, my eyes were clear. I started the editing all over again. I could see very well what needed to be done, and I did it. And I found, to my astonishment, that some of it was really not bad.

Just because I think it is good does not mean other people will too. Writing is a subjective business. One is always dependent on someone else’s opinion. There is no certainty, and this is part of what wears away at the troubled, questing, hopeful mind.

But today I know that all the work I have done is worth it, even if I do get rejected. That counts for something.

In the morning, before work, before thought, I ring The Beloved Cousin. At the very sound of her voice, I know that every single thing will be all right. She has that miraculous effect.

Friendship, I think, as I ride out later into the mild Scottish day, the air gentle against my face, never gets the press it deserves. It’s always romantic love which has the classic novels written about it, the songs, the poems, the plays, the films, the sonnets. But friend love, for me, is the one that saves your life, lifts your heart, restores your sanity, confirms your sense of self.

The Beloved Cousin understands every single word I say, laughs at my jokes, unpicks my troubles as if they were her own, makes me feel like a better human, remembers all the things I have forgotten, does not mind whether I am up, down or round the houses, expects me to be nothing but my own flawed, flaky self. She just gets it. (In this case, It is everything.)

As if determined to continue the love and loveliness, the red mare was at her absolute, shining, glittering crest and peak. She rode like a dream, was funny and dear, and showed off her dressage diva trot all the way down the lime avenue, with no reins and no stirrups. She seems to find it mildly amusing that I kick my feet out of the irons and wave my arms in the air, and boxes along in her best self-carriage whilst I laugh with delight.

And then there was the good work and I backed a ten-to-one winner at Goodwood as the ravishing Malabar, the only filly in the race, put the boys in their place, kicking away and streaking down the straight, her beautiful bay coat gleaming in the sun.

There are bad days, and good days. I like to record the good days, because when the shadows come, I find it soothing to look back and remember what the light is like. Today was all light.

Special Forces.

The sun shines. The Horse Talker and I take out our mares on the sweetest, happiest, most relaxed ride ever. I’m not sure I ever felt Red more gentle and at one with herself and the world. I don’t know who is more delighted that the weather has at last grown kind: equines or humans.

I run up to HorseBack. There is a crowd there. There sometimes is a crowd. I plunge in. I have no idea who anyone is. ‘Hello,’ I say, shaking hands, ‘how do you do? I’m Tania Kindersley. I do the Facebook page.’

Eventually, I sort some of them out. Two are from a venerable organisation which I cannot yet name (secret plans). One seems to be some kind of philanthropist, but I never get upsides him. Two are very smiley and jolly and funny and sharp. One is tall, and looks like Hugh Jackman. One is shorter, and is rather like a young Chevy Chase, and just as hilarious. Within minutes, my famous British reserve has fled. There is no more ‘how do you do?’ or firm handshakes. I am doubling up with laughter and actually slapping my thigh and shouting with merriment. I also quickly fall into teasing them, since they take the piss out of themselves, with ruthless irony.

It turns out that they are of the American Special Forces. When people from the services, on either side of the pond, talk of special forces, you can be sure that the special is very bloody special indeed. You can also be sure that the more special their service, the less they will talk about it. They occasionally get that thousand yard stare in their eyes, but they do not do bragging or war stories. They do self-deprecation as if their lives depend on it. (My favourite Para uses ‘when I was shot in the head’ as a gag line, like a stand-up, doing schtick.)

These two are heaven. I want to wrap them up and take them home. They were wounded in Afghan, and have been through the long months of rehabilitation. You would not know it to look at them; they are shining, healthy specimens. One has a barely visible scar at the base of his throat, the only outward sign of what he has been through.

One is back at work, no longer in the forces, but as a contractor. ‘Are you super- secret?’ I say, merrily. ‘Are you deep undercover? Can I take your picture?’

‘As long as you get my best side,’ he says, gravely.

‘I mostly hide under my desk now,’ he says. ‘And look at Facebook.’

‘Facebook is crazy,’ says the other one, in exaggerated alarm. ‘You just don’t know what people will say next.’

I know perfectly well there is no hiding under any desk, or much Facebook either. That is just how they talk.

They crack jokes for another ten minutes, and then HorseBack’s resident Royal Marine comes out to discuss where he should take them. They want to see a bit of Scotland.

‘We could go to Lochnagar,’ he says. ‘It’s not far from Balmoral. Near the Queen.’

‘If you see the Queen,’ says the Chevy Chase one. ‘Say ‘Chip, chip,’ from me.’

‘Chip, chip?’ I say.

‘That’s what you Brits say,’ says Chevy.

‘No Briton has ever said Chip, chip,’ I say. ‘What have you been doing? Watching Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins?’

‘Never?’ He looks bemused.

‘Never,’ I say.

There is a pause. Then a shout of laughter.

‘You British need to learn to speak British,’ he says.

I think how much I love Americans. Obviously, not all Americans. I don’t expect I would have much fun with one of those crazy evangelical GOP types, who thinks that gay people are mentally ill and that the fossil record was put there by Satan. But, oh, a good American is like a gale of fresh air. I never understand where the fantasy comes from that only the British can do irony. Has nobody ever seen The Daily Show? These two are so ironical that it is as if they took a course. There they stand, in the beaming Scottish sunshine, vivid and bright and endlessly funny, and I think of all the things they have done, and all the things they have seen, and the wounds they carry, quietly, with dignity, beneath their smart coats.

As I get older, I really, really understand the idea of one day at a time. It’s an old group therapy saw, its meaning worn thin with use. But I see now that the only way to deal with middle age, and the intimations of mortality, and the griefs which come, and the labyrinthine difficulties that go into trying to live the good life, is to ask the most simple questions. What shall I do today? What did I do today? Did I add one tiny increment to the sum total of human happiness? Did I try hard? Did I read something interesting or say something amusing or do something kind?

If someone were to ask what I did today, I could answer: well, I met a man from the Special Forces who looked like Hugh Jackman, and another who was as hysterical as Chevy Chase in his pomp.

It’s not a bad answer.

 

Today’s pictures:

The Special Forces, with HorseBack’s own Royal Marine on the right:

One of my happiest sights is the two girls out together, in the brightness, WITHOUT THEIR RUGS. The sweet Paint has had her breakfast and is waiting politely for the duchess to finish hers, so she may lick the bowl. It’s a little routine between them:

THE FIRST SNOWDROPS:

And the darling old hill, because as one of the Dear Readers reminded me, we have not had the hill for a while. It has been lost in the dreich:

One more very lovely thing did happen today, although I almost do not mention it, because the person concerned is a modest fellow who does not like compliments very much. Someone I like and respect very much gave me an unexpected present. It was a book, chosen with a great deal of thought and care, and it had an inscription written on the front page which was so touching and heartfelt, it actually made me cry.

A good day

No day is perfect. Every day has a bit of fret and scratch in it. But some days are composed of a great deal of loveliness and I think these should be marked. I think of them like that pot of gold of which Sebastian Flyte speaks in Brideshead Revisited: I bury them so that I may go back when I am old, and remember.

I also think, as I get older, that life is not made of grand sweeps. It is a thing of increments, not arcs. The question is not so much how far have you come, or how high may you fly, but – Did you have a good day?

The goodness of my day lay in small things. I wrote 1496 words. I watched my sweet canine make my mother smile and smile. I told her and the Lovely Stepfather the story of the great gamble, which came off yesterday, to the amazement and delight of most of the racing public. (Some were cross and strict about it, but the rules of racing were not breached, and it turned a mediocre card at Kempton on an ordinary Wednesday into a three-act opera.)

I rode in the clear Scottish air, and felt my red mare roll under me into the most lovely, relaxed canter, on a loose rein, her powerful body contained and at home in the world. I got my HorseBack work done.

I FINISHED THE TAX RETURN.

The paperwork wasn’t that terrifying in the end and I no longer feel like quite such an idiot. As I told myself this evening, I am a bit of an idiot, so it’s not surprising that sometimes I feel like one. It really is a logical cause and effect. This thought both soothed me and made me laugh.

I watched an enchanting horse called Little Legend win the hunter chase in the Warwick sunshine. Hunter chases are not the richest or most glamorous races on the card, but they often throw up some of the most taking horses. Little Legend is one of those. He is very small, and gallops along with his neck stretched out and his head low, and he is as tough and honest and willing as the day is long. He got a lovely sympathetic ride, and both he and his jockey had an absolute ball, and it was one of those tremendously happy sights that lift the heart. Nobody much is going to remember the 3.20 at Warwick. It shall not make the headlines. But it had a glancing loveliness which stayed with me and has made me smile ever since. I’m smiling now, as I write of it.

Then, after all that, with all my tasks done, I went down to do what I call evening stables. This is what it was called in my father’s yard, and it is what I call it still, even though we have no stables and at this time of year it takes place in the middle of the afternoon. It is the job of feeding and checking and settling the horses for the night. The hay must be put out, the water trough checked, the legs felt, the rugs adjusted. And, of course, the love given.

I left it late today, as the light is starting to stretch out now, and I arrived in the gloaming. A high, limpid sky had turned a gleaming blue, and the air was cold and still. The two dear white faces were turned expectantly towards me in the distance, and Stanley the Dog danced about the set-aside, hunting for critters. I did all the jobs, and I reflected that the good physical work of setting an equine to rights is one of the most uncomplicated pleasures there is.

I stood with the mare for a while, in the dying of the light. She ate her food and lifted her head from time to time to regard me with her kind eyes. I spoke to her, telling her my thoughts. She is a very good listener. ‘In this moment,’ I said, ‘every single thing is all right.’

She nodded, sagely.

I said: ‘Perhaps all that really matters is that in each day there is one moment when everything is all right.’

She sighed through her velvet nose.

I wondered if it were possible to love a sentient creature more than I love her. I thought probably not.

So, my darlings, it was a good day. That is all I wanted to tell you.

 

I haven’t had the camera out much lately, so these pictures are from the archive. They give you some idea of the tranquillity and joy:

More happy walking.

Another delightful family walk. The Older Niece sets off south first thing tomorrow, so it was our last walk with her, which is always a sadness. The Older Brother was not with us since he has gone off to run the ten kilometre race at Lumphanan. It’s the kind of thing he does. But his Best Beloved came with, and I gave The Sister charge of the red mare, and all the dogs were going crazy playing stick games, and it was very, very sweet.

The taking of the horses for a walk is considered a rather eccentric thing, although it seems perfectly natural to me. The Horse Talker and I started it when one or other of the mares was off riding from a muscle strain or a stone bruise. We took them out in hand to stretch their legs with no weight on their backs. The horses seemed to find it amazingly calming and relaxing, and we loved it too, so often now we just do it for fun.

Afterwards, I got up on Red and had a bit of a pipe-opener, and then a very dear contemporary of The Younger Niece came to have a ride on her. They went beautifully together and it gives me a huge amount of pleasure that I can offer this good horse to someone else to enjoy. So my lovely red girl gave an awful lot of delight all round today.

I’m giving myself another couple of festive days off, but small shoots of new ideas are growing, growing, in my head. Another secret project may be on the verge of arrival. I find myself rather excited at the thought.

 

Today’s pictures:

Wild stick action:

The special walk:

I sometimes think she does actually pose for the camera:

Here is The Visiting Rider. The very touching thing is that we have all known this rider since she was a tiny girl, on account of her being childhood friends with The Younger Niece. Now she is all grown-up, and wonderful to watch on a horse. She and the red mare had a lot of fun:

Work. With a bit of horse.

Work, work, work, work. It starts off feeling like a mountain to climb. Or mud to wade through. Or something very, very hard. Then I get the thrilling hint of possibility. That section works; that paragraph is true. Suddenly, I am motoring. I can see it.

So it is now almost six and I’m still bashing on, and I shall bash bash bash until ten, and there is no room for the blog. But the Dear Readers have been especially dear lately, and you must have a line or two, so you do not think I am dead in a ditch. (In my mind, you do sometimes become exactly like my mother.)

In between the writing and the editing and the squinting furiously at the screen and the tap tap tap of my manic fingers on the keyboard and the completely forgetting to have lunch, I took a moment to watch dear old Riverside Theatre at Huntingdon. He was once a mighty champ, but he lost his way last season and I hoped more than anything he might find his road home.

He started off bonny and bouncing, happy to be back, and then he made mistakes and started scribbling and scrabbling, losing that relentless rhythm which is what wins races. But his jockey, Barry Geraghty, has faith in the fella and would not give up on him. He cajoled him and pushed him and persuaded him and booted him, and almost lifted him over the last. It was a never say die ride such as you usually see from AP McCoy. (What would AP do? is my daily question now, as you know, and the thing he always does is never, ever give up.)

And suddenly, when all seemed lost, they got a little bit of luck, as the bold Champion Court found his saddle slipping and veered to the left, and dear old Riverside found his mojo again and shot through the gap and won by a neck.

It was not the prettiest run you ever saw, but it was a race in a hundred, and I shouted my head off, my heart lifting like a helium balloon. I love comebacks, even when they are messy as hell.

And the only other news, as I turn back to my deadline, and my acres and acres of prose, is that this person gave me the most glorious, dancing, lilting ride today, so that I shouted out loud into the clean Scottish air, with gratitude and love:

She may be furry and muddy and scruffy, but in my mind she is as gleaming and shining as Riverside Theatre and all her other cousins, racing out on the springing green turf, champions all.

In which I have absolutely no idea what I am talking about. But it was a very, very good day.

Author’s note: I got carried away with this one. It is long, baggy and tangential. The point gets lost somewhere in the sixth paragraph, and is never retrieved. But if you are willing to bash on, and dig with a spoon, there are some moments of loveliness.

 

I was thinking, this morning, about taking the good bits and leaving the rest. I like to pretend I know all about human complexity and the flaws and frailties flesh is heir to. I can get a bit swanky about how I do not put people into boxes. But still, I sometimes get pulled into the quicksand of the single label. This person is good, that one is bad; this one is a dullard, this one is quite coruscating; this one is a melancholic, that one is a sunny optimist.

The fact is that humans can be all these things, on the very same day. We are all on a veering, curving spectrum. (And you know how rarely I use the Universal We. But in this case I think it is called for.)

I was reminded the other day of something a wise person said to me. Or perhaps I mean a wise thing a person said. It was: ‘it is easy to behave well when you are happy.’ Often if someone is mean or unfair or sharp, it has nothing to do with you. I am always in danger of taking things personally, and off goes the three act drama, with me as the operatic star. Usually, in these cases, it is nothing to do with me and everything to do with the other person. They are wrangling with existential angst, or fretting about a beloved, or have suddenly lost their moments of glad grace. They don’t necessarily mean to, but they may take it out on the person nearest to them.

My old dad, whom I miss every day, was a man of labyrinthine complexity. He was adored throughout the racing world. He was the sweetest and funniest and most charming and eccentric gentleman. He could light up a room just by walking into it, even though he did not stride in like a colossus, but shuffled through the door with his shoulders hunched from all the operations he had to stop them falling out of their sockets in a tight finish, and his back slightly bent from the times he broke it. He would twinkle his eyes through his great spectacles and somehow everyone would feel better.

On a horse, he was brave as a lion. But he was also fabulously irresponsible, occasionally unreliable, and very, very naughty. He drank too much and gambled too much and chased far too many women. He loved his children but never particularly felt that he should do anything for us. In way, this was very liberating. There was no burden of expectation. He never told us how to live our lives, or read us lectures. I think I sometimes did wish for a regular, respectable dad, but in the end I realised that what I got was much, much better. He taught me the best lesson I ever learnt, by simple example. That is: to judge people exactly as you find them, not through the prism of class or money or colour or creed or sexuality. If someone could make my dad laugh, he did not give a bugger what car they drove or what school they went to.

Now, as I remember him and carry him with me, I leave the bad parts and contemplate only the good.

I was thinking particularly of him because a rather astounding thing happened a few days ago. A cousin of mine became a colonel. As I do my work with HorseBack, I always think: well, I know horses, but I don’t know the services. That is the new part which I am mapping. I don’t come from a military family, I tell people. Yet, all the time, there was this brave fighting relation, doing tours in Afghan, and now, being promoted to a rank which makes me take my hat off. The first thing I wrote, to the cousin and his sister, when I heard the news, was how much the auld fella would have laughed. It’s true. I am in awe and wonder, incredibly impressed by such dizzy heights. A colonel in the Household Cavalry is a mountain top which I can hardly imagine. But Dad would have roared with laughter. He would have been proud, of course, but he would have found it inexpressibly comical that someone in his family would do such a grown-up job. (He did his own national service in a cavalry regiment, joining the Hussars I am perfectly certain in the expectation that he could pitch up with his horse. I think he got a bit of a shock when he arrived at Salisbury Plain to find only tanks.) The lovely cousin and his proud sister wrote back to say that they were raising a glass to the old man.

So many good parts, I think. Who cares about the less good. Emphasise the positive, I think, and eliminate the negative and latch onto the affirmative and don’t mess with Mr In-Between.

People are always going to behave in ways that one might not choose. They may think thoughts that one would prefer they did not think. They will not always react in the hoped-for manner. They may baffle and confound. But I start to think that if you search for the good parts, the rest won’t matter so much.

The red mare is, in the magical part of my mind, the exception to the rule and perfect in every way. Of course this is not in fact true. She has her grouches and her small moments of stubbornness and her grumpy mornings. There are very few humans I secretly believe close to perfect, but one of them is my friend The World Traveller, who lives up the road and is my relation by marriage. This morning, she came to ride the mare for the first time. She is a tremendous horsewoman, but has been too busy bringing up four small children to think of things equine. I suddenly decided, on a whim: I have this great horse, and the WT is a great rider, and I am going to bring them together.

It was quite frightening, sending Red off into the unknown. What if disaster struck? What if my profound faith in this mighty mare is misplaced?

I need not have worried. Back they both came, after a morning out in the fields, wreathed in smiles. The World Traveller (given her blog name because she once rode across half of Asia on horses and camels) is not, of course, perfect. She has told me of her flaws, although I never quite believe her. But she is one of the sunniest, kindest, most generous-hearted people I know, and being able to put her up on my equally big-hearted mare made me happier than I can say.

This blog did have a serious point when I started it. I think it was about complexity. Now, as I wander towards the end, I realise that I have galloped off on my usual tangents, and I have absolutely no idea what it was that was so important I had to write it down for you.

Perhaps it was a rumination on my daily fight against perfection, against black and white, against false expectations, against cramming people into boxes.

I am galvanised and filled with energy today. After the World Traveller got off the red mare, I got on, and went out riding with a friend who had arrived unexpectedly on his Quarter Horse. Red got rather excited about the arrival of a handsome gelding on the property and flirted with him shamelessly, sticking out her nose and fluttering her eyelashes.

Away in the fields, she suddenly realised she had a fit horse, on its toes, to run against. My dozy old donkey remembered her racing past. I felt the competitive spirit rushing through her. All right, I said, you can go if you want. I gave her her head. And then she recalled that she was a dowager duchess, and settled back to her stately canter as the other fella tore off up the hill, and we rolled along on a loose rein, with me laughing my head off. Red’s loveliness is so intense that a smile is not enough; the joy comes out of me in great whoops of hilarity.

It was another of our greatest rides. There were the hills, open before us; there was the clean Scottish air on our faces. Under me, was a horse who is all kindness and generosity and sweetness. She could have been infected by the high spirits of the new equine who had pitched up in her territory. She could have pulled and pranced and forgotten herself. She could have charged off into the blue horizon. Even the best schooled horse can do this in such a situation. But she chose not to. She had a ball, but her steadiness never left her.

And that is why I am wild with joy and pride, and unable to stop typing, and that is how I ended up with a long, tangled, not-making-much-sense post, because at times like this I want to tell you everything, and I have no editing facility.

But perhaps, if my subject was partly the danger of expecting the perfect, that is just as it should be. I would love to give you tight, finely-honed prose every day. But some days, it is going to be woolly and wandering, and maybe that is the whole point.

 

Just time for two pictures:

The unexpected visitor, with whom we rode:

And one of my best ever sights – the return of the travellers, beaming with delight. I don’t know which of them looks happier:

Work, horse, love.

The kind of slang I use tends to be very, very old school. It is more likely to be drawn from Evelyn Waugh and Nancy Mitford and PG Wodehouse than the current demotic. But today I would like to say that I absolutely SMASHED my work.

It’s the approach to my second deadline, which is a renegotiated first-and-half draft date. In the end, it was decided that it would be just too scary for the poor agent to read the full mess and muddle which was the raw first draft. But she would like to see something before Christmas, which does not give time for a full second draft, but does allow for a tidied up, nicely trimmed and frankly less alarming version.

The push for this is not as manic as getting the thing written in the first place. There is some sturdy earth on which to plant my stuttering feet. The story exists; the chapters are there. There is, after a fashion, a beginning, middle and end.

All the same, it requires a lot of concentration and effort.

So there may not be much room for blog, as I charge into the final furlong.

Red the Mare very kindly put her shoulder to the wheel and did her bit for my mental health. This morning she gave me a ride of such loveliness that I whooped out loud on three separate occasions and fell on her neck with fervent congratulation and love twice. The Remarkable Trainer, who was on the American Paint filly, discreetly averted her eyes and did not say anything. Really professional horsewomen tend not to whoop and hug. The best horsemen and women, I have noticed, don’t use their voices much at all. Horses are visual creatures, rather than verbal ones. (This is because they came out of the woods very early in their evolution, and their defining characteristics were mapped out on the plains.) 

But I can’t help it.

The red mare makes me so happy and so proud that I can’t contain myself. This is slightly nuts for a middle-aged female who has been round the block, but there we are. When I ask myself what AP would do, I know the answer would be: not this. He might allow himself a small smile; he would give the horse a restrained pat on the shoulder. I holler and throw my arms in the air and hurl myself bodily up her dear neck. As I do so, I can just about see the corner of her face. It seems to be wearing a quizzical smile, as if to say: just let the old girl get it out of her system. She is not only a very clever and beautiful and talented equine, but remarkably forgiving as well.

Usually, when I ride her, my cares all soar away in that very moment. Once I am off her back, I return at once to the normal work frenzy of tension and push. The medicine only obtains when I am with the good doctor. But on this bright, mild Monday, it lasted all day. The shoulders did not go back up; the sense of frazzle and fret did not return. I did my work, acres and acres of it, and it came easily, and I was not lashing myself but enjoying the process. I kept stopping and smiling, as the memory of the beautiful contained trot and the gentle rolling canter flashed into my mind. That damn mare is a miracle horse and I don’t care who knows it.

 

No time for pictures today, just a couple of Herself with her most demure, I am doing my good work face on. Remarkable Trainer up:

Oh, and actually one more which I can’t resist. One of the things I love about keeping the mare out is that she can be her own, horsey self. She can get as muddy and scruffy and filthy as she wishes. Today, she took this remit to its full limit. I love this picture not because she looks beautiful. She looks like an old donkey. I love it because she is a horse at ease with herself:

Day in pictures

In terms of quality, these are not the best photographs I have ever taken, but there is a sort of sweetness and joy in them which is perfect for the end of a long week.

Stanley the Dog with his small friend:

Morning sheep:

Mist over the hill:

I don’t know what this was, but I rather like it; a little bit of abstract for you:

This one is slightly out of focus, but I love the nobility:

The red mare is still a bit tender in her shoulder, so we are taking her for gentle morning walks. I completely love it, as you can see from my delirious expression. In fact, The Horse Talker leads her own filly, and I take Red and Stanley, but here I am managing all three in order for the photograph to be taken. Quite a lot of complicated rope action:

More happiness:

What we walked past:

At this stage, she was posing for the camera:

This one is completely blurry, but I wanted to include it because it expresses well the joy in this simple morning exercise:

Also, how amazingly good and clever is Red, just standing on command like that, with her rope over her shoulder? It’s the kind of thing which makes me hysterically proud. Stand, stand, I say seriously, and move off about ten feet, and she DOES NOT MOVE A HOOF.

At this stage, there will be those of you who are saying enough with the red mare. I give you full permission to bash off and read something interesting about psephology or horticulture. It’s a Friday, and I can’t have enough of this beautiful face:

One final bit of sweetness. The Horse Talker is pointing to try and get Red to prick her ears and pose for the photograph. We have absolutely no idea what Autumn the Filly is doing, but it’s very funny:

Really am stopping now.

I’ve written THOUSANDS of words this week and my head is about to come off. I’m going to take the whole weekend for resting; no HorseBack, no blog, no book. I’m going to watch the racing at Newmarket and mooch about with my lovely girl and throw sticks for Stanley the Dog and let my mind go slack. At the moment, it is tight as a drum. I am going to take a big old breath and let everything settle.

A day in brief.

Sun shines like gangbusters. Bad mood fled for the hills. Red the Mare at her dearest, funniest, cleverest, most characterful best. HorseBack work done. 1104 words of book. Faint sense of optimism. Stanley the Dog in most exuberant, affectionate mood. (He suddenly decides that the Horse Talker is his new favourite person in the entire world and covers her in extravagant kisses, then sits staunchly upright by her side, looking incredibly pleased with himself. This is interesting, since he is reticent with his kisses. He is not a slobbery dog.) The lovely Laytown races are about to make their idiosyncratic annual appearance. A race meeting run on the sand with the sea in the background, so lovely that I could sing songs about it. That’s what I shall be watching for the rest of this sunny day.

Today’s pictures:

No time for camera, so a quick selection from the last few days:

HorseBack hills:

HorseBack foal:

The new friends:

Sheer handsomeness:

Rosemary:

Cotinus:

M the dear little P:

Rowan berries:

Adore seeing this girl taking her ease out in the trees:

The Older Brother’s best beloved just sent me this:

Hill:

Ha. As I write this, the lovely Captain May has just danced over the sands to give me a winner at Laytown. I never back winners there, since it is such an eccentric track and the results are unpredictable. That’s made me smile and smile. Now if only the equally lovely Drahem can do the same at Lingfield for the most excellent James Fanshawe, I shall be able to buy Red and Stanley a present.

(It’s usually at this stage that one of my family or friends clears their throats and suggests an ‘intervention’. I should look stern and talk about gambling responsibly. But my darling old dad taught me to gamble irresponsibly, and I can’t be Captain bloody Sensible all the damn time.)